Caterina Tricase

Recycled-PET fibre based panels for building thermal insulation: Environmental impact and improvement potential assessment for a greener production

A screening of Life Cycle Assessment for the evaluation of the damage arising from the production of 1 kg of recycled Polyethylene Terephthalate (RPET) fibre-based panel for building heat insulation was carried out according to the ISO 14040:2006 and 14044:2006. All data used were collected on site based on observations during site visits, review of documents and interviews with technical personnel and management. These data were processed by using SimaPro 7.3.3, accessing the Ecoinvent v.2.2 database and using the Impact 2002+ method. The study showed damage to be equal to 0.000299 points mostly due to the: 1) PET thermo-bonding fibre supply from China by means of a freight-equipped intercontinental aircraft; 2) production of bottle-grade granulate PET; 3) medium voltage electricity consumption during the manufacturing of RPET fibre panel. It was also highlighted that there were environmental benefits due to recycling through mainly avoiding significant emissions and reduced resource consumption. An improvement assessment was carried out to find solutions aimed at reducing the damage coming from the most impacting phases. Furthermore, the environmental impacts due to the production of the analysed RPET fibre-based panel were compared to other materials with the same insulating function, such as polystyrene foam, rock wool and cork slab. Finally, the environmental benefits of the recycling of PET bottles for flake production were highlighted compared to other treatment scenarios such as landfill and municipal incineration.

The European Policy for the Sustainability of Urban Areas and the “Covenant of Mayors” Initiative: A Case Study

The “Covenant of Mayors” (CoM) is an initiative of the DG for Energy of the European Commission. It was started in 2008, with the aim of reducing Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) by 20 % by 2020 through the implementation of adequate actions taken in agreement between the European Commission and the municipalities (so called signatories), which intend to adhere. The actions are identified and listed in the “Sustainable Energy Action Plan (SEAP),” which each signatory must produce within one year from adhesion and submit to the European organisms for formal approval and consequent accession to financial tools to implement them. A total of 36 (out of 61) municipalities of the province of Foggia subscribed to the above-mentioned agreement in 2010 and, 1 year later, submitted their SEAPs to the validation of the experts of the Joint Research Centre-Institute of Energy (JRC-IE) of the European Commission. All the submitted SEAPs were formally approved in July 2012. This chapter reports on the methodology the authors used for the elaboration of the SEAPs and the achieved results.

Greenhouse gas emissions of an agro-biogas energy system: Estimation under the Renewable Energy Directive.

Agro-biogas from energy crops and by-products is a renewable energy carrier that can potentially contribute to climate change mitigation. In this context, application of the methodology defined by the Renewable Energy Directive 2009/28/EC (RED) was performed in order to estimate the 100-year Global Warming Potential (GWP100) associated with an agro-biogas supply chain (SC) in Southern Italy. Doing so enabled calculation of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emission saving in order to verify if it is at least equal to 35% compared to the fossil fuel reference system, as specified by the RED. For the assessment, an attributional Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach (International Organization for Standardization (ISO), 2006a,b) was integrated with the RED methodology applied following the guidelines reported in COM(2010)11 and updated by SWD(2014)259 and Report EUR 27215 EN (2015). Moreover, primary data were collected with secondary data extrapolated from the Ecoinvent database system. Results showed that the GWP100 associated with electricity production through the biogas plant investigated was equal to 111.58gCO2eqMJe(-1) and so a 40.01% GHG-emission saving was recorded compared to the RED reference. The highest contribution comes from biomass production and, in particular, from crop cultivation due to production of ammonium nitrate in the overall amount used for crop cultivation. Based upon the findings of the study, the GHG saving calculated slightly exceeds the related minimum proposed by the RED: therefore, improvements are needed anyway. In particular, the authors documented that through replacement of ammonium nitrate with urea the GHG-emission saving would increase to almost 68%, thus largely satisfying the RED limit. In addition, the study highlighted that conservation practices, such as NT, can significantly enable reduction of the GHG-emissions coming from agricultural activities. Therefore, those practices should be increasingly adopted for cultivation of energy crops, because the latter significantly contribute to biogas production yield enhancement.

Environmental analysis of biogas production systems

The awareness of an energy market in evolution leads us to look for solutions through new and different technological and normative instruments. Of particular interest is anaerobic digestion, a mature but still promising technology that could help to minimize environmental impact related to both GHG emissions and livestock waste management, and to add value to agricultural byproducts. The biogas energy system is extremely complex because of a series of variables such as the raw materials, adopted technologies, different uses of obtained energy products and digestate. Therefore, the environmental assessment will depend on the energy context and its potential changes on waste management, as well as the geographical area of reference. This article aims to assess the environmental impact of biogas production systems, taking into account both the indirect benefits achieved by replacement of fossil fuels and the direct benefits coming from changes in land use, raw materials and animal effluent management.